Bio-Bites!

GM-food to be labeled in Vermont?

Vermont has mandated labeling of food containing genetically modified ingredients by July 2016. Representatives of the food and biotechnology industries and the US Grocery Manufacturers Association in Washington DC are opposed to the law, and it is likely to be challenged in the federal court.¹

Constructing a phylogenetic tree for brewer’s yeast

Californian yeast distributing company “White Labs” and two researchers from the University of Leuven, The Netherlands (K Verstrepen and B Landuyt) have teamed up to sequence more than 240 different brewing yeast strains from around the world.

By comparing each yeast’s sequence information with the brewing data of the respective beers, the researchers hope to be able to select different properties in yeasts and breed them together to generate new ones.

The falling cost of sequencing have made this project possible; the first 96 strains at White Labs were sequenced free of charge by the biotechnology company Illumina to assess one of its new sequencing machines.²

Synthetic biology enters the market

According to a recent article in “The New York Times,” several companies have started using ingredients produced by synthetic biology methods. Examples cited in this article include a liquid laundry detergent containing an oil produced by genetically modified algae. This oil is used as a replacement for palm kernel oil. The high global demand for palm kernel oil is considered a major ecological problem, as tropical rain forests are being felled to make way for palm plantations.

Environmental and consumer groups are calling on companies to include labels on their products that indicate that synthetic biology was used to make some of its ingredients.³

Direct ethanol production from switchgrass

In a publication authored by Janet Westpheling, the direct conversion of plant biomass to ethanol by engineered Caldicellulosiruptor bescii is reported. The authors engineered the thermophilic, anaerobic, cellulolytic bacterium, which efficiently uses non-pretreated biomass, to produce ethanol. This process was accomplished by deletion of lactate dehydrogenase and heterologous expression of a Clostridium thermocellum bifunctional acetaldehyde and/or alcohol dehydrogenase. Direct conversion of biomass to ethanol offers the potential for carbon neutral, cost-effective, sustainable fuel production.⁴

Controlling malaria by genetically engineered mosquitoes?

Malaria is a life-threatening disease caused by Plasmodium parasites that are transmitted to people via infected Anopheles mosquitoes. According to a fact sheet published on the World Health Organization‘s website, in 2012, malaria caused an estimated 627 000 deaths, mostly among African children. In a recent publication authored by N Windbichler and A Crisanti of Imperial College London, control of the mosquito population by genetic engineering is described. The highly specific homing endonuclease I-PpoI, which cuts a conserved sequence within the ribosomal rDNA repeats located on the mosquito’s X chromosome, is expressed restrictively during male meiosis, resulting in fully fertile mosquito strains that produce >95% male offspring. These so-called distorter male mosquitoes can efficiently suppress caged wild-type mosquito populations, providing the foundation for a new class of genetic vector control strategies.⁵

First human trial on GM banana to start soon

In 2012, an international team led by investigators in France sequenced the banana genome. Two years later, the Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane, Australia, announced in a press release that the world's first human trial of pro-vitamin A-enriched banana, expected to lift the health and well-being of millions of Ugandans and other East Africans, was imminent. The QUT project, led by Professor James Dale and financed with close to $10 million from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, is one of the most significant biofortification projects in the world today. The bananas have been harvested from the QUT field trial in Innisfail, North Queensland, and were transported to the United States for the world’s first human trial. The human trial will last for six weeks with conclusive results expected by the end of the year.⁶